There is no straight, clear-cut path to building a successful and profitable internet business. However, there are best practices and tips you can follow to ensure you are moving in the right direction.

Most successful businesses have the same traits, and their owners all adhered to a universal set of principles, albeit with variations. Getting results is always at the forefront of their minds, and they don’t let themselves stray from the goals they set.

If you’re looking for how to build a successful internet business, here are some tips you can use to ensure you stay focused on your goals and remain on the right path to growing a profitable online business.

#1 – Understand Your Business Model

The actual business model that entrepreneurs follow can change often until they find the one that’s going to generate the most profits for them.

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For instance, if you’re trying to sell 10 different products or services in the hopes that one will show promise, you could end up wasting a ton of time.

Instead, spend more time figuring out what problems your business can solve, then dial into the specific problem that you’re able to charge the highest hourly rate or the highest price. After which you should then double down your efforts on that one specific product or service.

The best businesses are built around a singular focus that is later expanded once the first focus is mastered.

#2 – Know Your Target Customer

There’s one rule you need to follow when it comes to implementing marketing strategies, and this is knowing that “when you’re marketing to everyone, you’re actually marketing to no one.”

The rule is fairly simple. If you believe everyone is your customer, you’re going to have a hard time getting your message to the people that are actually your customers.

Instead of trying to create marketing messages for everyone, you should spend time instead on figuring out who your perfect customer is, understand their unique problems, and then create marketing messages that are custom-tailored specifically to those needs.

The end result will be you talking directly to the type of person that could have the shortest path to becoming your customer, which will increase your conversion rates and also your profits.

#3 – Become the Expert

If you are building a business around a topic that you’re passionate about, you’ll want to make sure you understand the subject matter in the deepest sense possible.

What this will do is help you position yourself as the true expert in your arena, which will have other business owners looking to you as the leader in the industry.

This is where niching down in your business becomes critical. It’s a lot easier to be the best “underwater basket weaver” than it is to be the best basket weaver. People in the basket weaving industry will refer to you as the best underwater basket weaver when other people ask.

Become the specialist in the area that you truly specialize in. Your job will be a lot easier in the long run.

#4 – Push Your Influence

Nearly every entrepreneur wants to be the next big overnight success story. However, the most successful businesses I’ve seen have been built over time, and they were built by tapping into the entrepreneur’s influence in the marketplace they’re serving.

To do this, you need to identify your branding and your brand’s messaging. If you’ve identified your unique target market, this is easy.

The next step is your home. This is the place where you’re going to publish all the amazing problem-solving content that you’re going to be creating.

Like your expertise, it’s best to dial into 1 or 2 specific “homes” to make sure you’re having the biggest impact. Spreading yourself too thin will dramatically reduce your ability to get results as quickly as you want to.

#5 – Focus on The Funnel

If you’re not familiar with what a “funnel” is, here’s a quick example:

You have visitors coming into your website. Some of those visitors are going to become email subscribers. Some of your email subscribers will eventually buy your low-end products. Some of those buyers will buy your mid-range products. Some mid-range product buyers will eventually buy your high-ticket offers.

This is the perfect example of a funnel. You’re “funnelling” people from the top of your business—the visitors—through your product lineup to the sales of your high-end products and services.

If you’re not focusing on your funnel, you’re going to be leaving money on the table. To get started, figure out what problems your target market are experiencing, create solutions to those problems, and guide your visitors through the path of solving each problem individually.

#6 – Money Matters

Before you dive into your content and marketing head first, you need to figure out how you’re actually going to monetize the traffic sources that you’re tapping into.

Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of building the traffic first and then try to figure out how to monetize that traffic once it’s coming. If you want to build a truly profitable business, you need to look at it from the other side of the equation.

Your goal should be to start making sales as early as possible in order to build your business. The sooner you’re able to start making sales, the sooner you’re going to be able to reinvest money into the business and grow it even quicker.

#7 – Drive Traffic

An internet business is nothing without traffic. You can’t just drive any old traffic to your website, though. You need to tap into proven traffic sources.

Here are some of the most common traffic strategies that have already been proven:

Organic search engine traffic.

Social media traffic.

Guest posting traffic.

Paid search traffic.

Paid social media traffic.

These are not just the easiest traffic sources to understand, but also the easiest for beginners to start tapping into. As your business becomes more consistent and profitable, you’ll be able to venture out and test new traffic strategies.

#8 – Convert the Sale

Once you’ve got traffic coming into your website, you need to constantly work on converting more of that traffic into new leads and customers.

Conversion rate optimization is part art and part science. You’ll have to learn how to examine the data you’re looking at. Then you can notice small tweaks that you can make in order to keep your visitors more engaged, so you have a chance to convert them down the road.

Increasing your conversion rates can mean the difference between a winning traffic campaign, and one that makes you want to throw in the towel on your business because you think it’s a failed venture.

#9 – Never Quit Building

Many entrepreneurs will put in the hard work upfront, and when they believe they’ve reached a critical mass of success for their internet business, they decide to finally go off and let the business sustain itself.

However, what typically happens is that the business will start trending downward, and since the entrepreneur isn’t staying ahead of the curve, they’ll be left wondering what’s going wrong.

When you’ve got the momentum building in your business, keep building on it. Never slow down, even when you feel like it’s time to coast and enjoy the fruits of your labor.

To Sum It Up

There is no straight success route from A to Z as an entrepreneur. However, if you delve into the 9 tips above taken from successful businesses, you will save yourself valuable time and energy while building your own profitable internet business.

About The Writer

This is a guest blog post submitted by Jock Purtle. He is the CEO and founder of digitalexits.com, a successful business that’s into brokerage.

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About Stan Edom

I'm an entrepreneur with an expertise in supply chain management, small business development, e-commerce, internet startups, and agriculture. In my spare time, I'm always trying to solve problems people face in their everyday lives with tech.

1 Comment Already

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